Uruguay's FA Asks Orsi Not to Fine CONMEBOL for Betting Shirts at the Final

Bookmakers are not licensed in Uruguay, so when a visiting Brazilian side plays in Montevideo with a betting sponsor on its shirt, the state fines CONMEBOL, CONMEBOL passes it to the AUF, and the AUF passes it to the home club. With the Copa Libertadores final at the Centenario on 28 November, President Orsi calls that "a kind of absurdity". He also says the law will not change.

• AUF president Ignacio Alonso and director Eduardo Ache asked President Yamandú Orsi not to fine CONMEBOL if a team displays betting advertising on its shirt at the Copa Libertadores final, in a meeting also attended by CONMEBOL president Alejandro Domínguez, the weekly Búsqueda reported, as relayed by Teledoce and Yogonet
• The final is scheduled for 28 November at the Estadio Centenario in Montevideo; the AUF's argument included CONMEBOL's willingness to award Uruguay the final and the economic impact of hosting it
• Because betting houses are not authorised in Uruguay, the finance ministry fines CONMEBOL as organiser when a shirt or broadcast carries a bookmaker's name, and the fine is passed down to the Uruguayan home club
• Orsi told reporters it is "a kind of absurdity that we have to resolve", noting that "almost all the Brazilian teams" carry betting sponsors, but said "we are not analysing changing that legally, that was not the proposal"
• CONMEBOL already provides for different static and broadcast advertising by territory; the problem it cannot solve is the visiting team's kit

A Fine That Lands on the Club That Did Nothing

The Uruguayan Football Association (AUF) has asked the government not to fine the South American Football Confederation (CONMEBOL) over betting advertising at the Copa Libertadores final, which is to be played on 28 November at the Estadio Centenario in Montevideo, according to a report in the weekly Búsqueda relayed by Teledoce and Yogonet. AUF president Ignacio Alonso and director Eduardo Ache made the request to President Yamandú Orsi at a meeting at the presidential residence, attended also by CONMEBOL president Alejandro Domínguez, held to discuss the final.

The mechanism at issue is unusual. Betting houses are not authorised to operate in Uruguay, and when a Libertadores or Sudamericana match is played there with a bookmaker's name visible, on a visiting team's shirt or in the broadcast, the Ministry of Economy and Finance fines CONMEBOL as the event's organiser for breaching the law. CONMEBOL passes the fine to the AUF, which in turn passes it to the Uruguayan club that was the home side, Teledoce reports. The AUF's request was that the sanction be suspended for the final, and among its arguments were CONMEBOL's willingness to give Uruguay the final and the economic impact of hosting it.

Orsi was candid about the problem at a press conference on Thursday, 10 September. "When the television signal shows a team that has one of these betting companies, the Uruguayan football clubs have to pay a fine," he said. "We are facing a difficulty, more so if we consider what the Libertadores or the Sudamericana are, where almost all the Brazilian teams already have them. So the fine falls on the Uruguayan clubs." He called it "a sword of Damocles" hanging over the clubs and "a kind of absurdity that we have to resolve", while distinguishing the parts that can be managed: "One thing is the static advertising or the signal that appears on screen, that can be handled. Now, when a team comes, it's difficult."

He was equally clear about what the government would not do. "We are not analysing changing that legally, that was not the proposal," Orsi said. CONMEBOL already provides for differentiated advertising by broadcast territory for static and on-screen inventory, Teledoce notes; the visiting kit is the element neither the confederation nor the host can alter.

A Prohibition That Fines Its Own Clubs Is a Prohibition Without a Theory

Uruguay's law is designed to keep bookmakers out of the country. Its effect at a continental final is to charge a Montevideo club for the sponsor on a São Paulo shirt, which deters nothing, since the Brazilian club is paid by an operator that does not need Uruguayan customers, and punishes the one party with no say in the matter. Orsi has recognised the absurdity and ruled out fixing the law that produces it, which leaves an administrative waiver for a single match as the likeliest outcome. That is a sensible short-term answer and a revealing one: a state that will not license betting but will suspend its own penalties when the final comes to town has decided the prohibition is worth keeping in principle and worth ignoring in practice.

Brazil's Shirts Are Now a Regional Export

The reason this has become a presidential matter is that Brazilian club football is saturated with betting sponsorship, and Brazilian clubs dominate the Libertadores. A rule that made sense when an occasional visitor carried a bookmaker's logo breaks when "almost all" of them do. Every neighbouring market with a restriction on betting advertising, and the advertising rules Brazil itself is tightening, will face the same collision at the next fixture, and the answer CONMEBOL has arrived at, territory-specific broadcast feeds, stops at the touchline.

The final will almost certainly go ahead with a betting logo on a shirt and no fine. What Uruguay has not decided is what its law is for once that has happened.